THE ENERGY INDUSTRY TIMES - OCTOBER 2016
Technology
Living with smart grids
PowerMatching City was the irst European ield trial of smart grids. Phase 2 kicked off in 2011, expanding the connected community from 25 to 40 households
The PowerMatching
City demonstration
project at Hoogkerk
ended in late 2015,
but the smart grid
infrastructure remains
in place to support
any future projects.
PowerMatching City
was envisioned as a
demonstration of the
possibilities of smart
grid technologies –
something it clearly
achieved.
Albert van der Noort
Smart meters and a power
monitor give people feedback
on their own energy
consumption and generation,
which they could compare
with the averages from the
entire street
F or most people in the power in-
dustry, the question isn’t
“should we build smart grids?”
it is “how and how fast?” The need
to maintain an affordable, reliable
and sustainable electricity supply
makes smart grids inevitable. But we
have no previous hands-on experi-
ence, so how can the industry and
society in general make sure it is
making the right choices in imple-
menting smart grids?
This was the question that demon-
stration project PowerMatching
City was set up to explore. While
Phase 1 of the project focused on
the technical feasibility of smart
grids, the recently completed Phase
2 looked at how smart grids and the
lexibility they bring add value for
consumers, the energy industry and
communities.
PowerMatching City is a living lab
for exploring the future of energy
(electricity, gas and heat) infrastruc-
tures. Located at Hoogkerk near
Groningen in the Netherlands, it was
the irst European ield trial of smart
grids and was designed to test centr-
alised and renewable energy systems
on a community-wide level.
The trial was launched in 2009 by
a consortium of leading players in
the Dutch energy industry and aca-
demia, coordinated by DNV GL.
Phase 2 kicked off in 2011, expand-
ing the connected community from
25 to 40 households and with a brief
to explore the market mechanisms
that should be deployed with smart
grids.
This is critical to the success or
failure of smart grids and green ener-
gy in general. If we want to make the
transition to a sustainable energy fu-
ture as eficient as possible, we need
to get consumers involved in that
transition. We need to ind out what
services and incentives work for
them.
In the trial community, electricity is
generated by solar panels. Some of
the homes have a micro combined
heat and power (CHP) system that
can generate electricity and heat ac-
cording to demand. The heat pro-
duced can be stored in a buffer tank
if necessary. Other homes have a
heat pump connected to a buffer tank
in order to lexibly use the power and
provide heat depending on the luc-
tuating demand.
In addition, homes are equipped
with programmable appliances, such
as washing machines. The specially
created PowerMatcher operating sys-
tem matches the energy supply and
demand of various providers and us-
ers in real-time, allowing the smart
management of appliances and sys-
tems. This management could take
one of three forms:
n Automatic control of the heat
pump or micro CHP
- PowerMatcher autonomously de-
cides when to switch on and off in
response to energy costs / demand
n Semi-automatic control of the
washing machine
- PowerMatcher switches on the
appliance in response to demand but
within boundary conditions (e.g. lat-
est end time) set by user
n Manual control of dishwasher, hair
dryer, etc.
- User decides when to switch on
and off, possibly guided by informa-
tion from PowerMatcher.
Smart meters and a power monitor
give people feedback on their own
energy consumption and generation,
which they could compare with the
averages from the entire street.
To explore the most suitable mar-
ket mechanisms for smart grids, re-
searchers and residents at Power-
Matching City developed two
contrasting energy services. The irst,
Smart Cost Savings, allowed resi-
dents to minimise the cost of energy
consumption and generation. The
second service, known as More Sus-
tainable Together, focused on maxi-
mising the share of renewables with-
in the community’s energy mix by
channelling any excess energy back
into the community.
Residents were allocated to the two
services randomly, and researchers
measured the actual energy con-
sumption and generation of all the
devices in the home over a period of
seven months. Those on the Smart
Cost Savings were shown the effects
of their energy as a Euro value, while
the More Sustainable Together ser-
vice presented the user’s impact via
leaf symbols.
Being environmentally minded,
the majority of residents originally
expressed a preference for the More
Sustainable Together service. But
by the end of the trial, most found
that the Smart Cost Savings service
actually itted their needs better.
This is not to say that the residents
chose lower cost over higher sustain-
ability. Rather, it highlights the difi-
culty and importance of expressing
the value of sustainability. Services
need to be simple and simple to un-
derstand. But sustainability is a difi-
cult topic for consumers to under-
stand, as it is hard to see how your
individual actions impact the entire
system.
Residents said they found the infor-
mation on costs tangible and moti-
vating. By contrast, the leaf symbols
and the sustainability gains they rep-
resented were seen as less tangible.
Interestingly, residents on the Smart
Cost Savings service were far more
likely to manually start their appli-
ances at times suggested by the
PowerMatcher and checked their en-
ergy monitor on average twice as of-
ten as people using the More Sus-
tainable Together service.
This suggests that, to ensure the
success of services, service providers
need to ind a way to express sustain-
ability in a way that engages con-
sumers. And that often means pre-
senting it as some kind of monetary
value.
One of the key advantages of a
smart grid is the lexibility it offers.
Analysis of the results from Power-
Matching City suggests that this lex-
ibility in the Dutch consumer market
could be worth €1-3.5 billion for the
period to 2050. This divides into
beneits for system operators and
beneits for the energy market as a
whole.
For system operators, the key ben-
eits are the need to invest less in de-
veloping new networks and main-
taining existing ones plus fewer
losses due to long distance transport.
Meanwhile energy providers in the
wholesale market can proit in the
wholesale price to purchase cheaper
energy for their customers.
This lexibility relies on energy
providers having some control over
when consumers use and generate
electricity. Hence it is vital that con-
sumers understand and buy into their
role in delivering lexibility, and bal-
ancing supply and demand.
The automatically controlled ap-
pliances (micro CHP, heat pump
and – where present – electric vehi-
cles) offer suppliers most lexibility.
Residents also reported that these
appliances contributed most to the
goals of the energy services. They
were more than happy for the Power-
Matcher to control these appliances
automatically so long as they
worked as required.
For example, people didn’t mind
when their electric car was charged
so long as it was ready to go when
they were. Occasionally, the resi-
dents noticed that certain devices
switched on or off at seemingly il-
logical times. And once the user has
15
lost conidence in the device, it is
very hard to win it back.
On the other hand, manual control
– guided by the energy monitor –
gave people the greatest sense of sat-
isfaction with and control over the
system. In fact, once they had
learned a little about demand and
cost cycles, many residents preferred
to control the semi-automatic wash-
ing machines themselves – turning
them on and off at the best times.
In a smart grid, much of the lexi-
bility lies with the individual con-
sumers. So how do we let grid opera-
tors and energy suppliers utilise these
small packets of lexibility effective-
ly while giving the consumers ready
access to the market? One of the key
indings of PowerMatching City
Phase 2 was that a single party
should be responsible for bundling
and distributing this lexibility for
the market.
Exactly how this aggregator role
should be implemented remains an
open question and is currently being
explored by the Universal Smart En-
ergy Framework (USEF) Founda-
tion, drawing on the lessons learnt at
PowerMatching City.
PowerMatching City was envi-
sioned as a demonstration of the pos-
sibilities of smart grid technologies –
something it clearly achieved. Phase
1 showed that smart grids are techni-
cally feasible. Phase 2 went further
by demonstrating how the lexibility
of smart grids has economic value. It
also proved that desirable energy ser-
vices can be built on smart grid in-
frastructure, and that market barriers
to the monetisation of lexibility can
be eliminated relatively cheaply.
The PowerMatching City demon-
stration project at Hoogkerk ended in
late 2015, but the smart grid infra-
structure remains in place to support
any future projects. Meanwhile the
challenge of demonstration has
passed on to larger-scale projects
such as EnergieKoplopers, a 200-
home ield trial at Heerhugowaard in
the Netherlands, being carried out by
the Smart Energy Collective based
on the principles of USEF.
Projects such as PowerMatching
City and EnergieKoplopers will give
governments and the industry the in-
formation and experience they need
to make the right strategic choices
for implementing smart grids. These
choices will need to be made at the
European level to deliver the desired
legislative framework in European
Union member states. Critical to this
process is a clear timeline so that the
investment risk for the energy sector
and the providers can be managed
and the likelihood of dis-investments
is reduced to a minimum.
Albert van der Noort is ‘Head of
section – Smart Energy’ at DNV GL.
He is project manager of Power-
Matching City.